Royal Wellington’s Different Math In The New Zealand Golf Economy

New Zealand’s golf boom has been built on visual spectacle—courses designed to be seen as much as played. In a market where destination golf is increasingly defined by drama and isolation, that approach has helped turn the country into one of the game’s most aspirational backdrops.

If J.M.W. Turner painted fairways, this is what they might look like. Fairways drape across cliffs, coastlines and mountain ranges, revealing eye-popping scenery that has doubled for Middle-earth, Narnia and Pandora in blockbuster franchises.

For a growing wave of travel golfers, playing the likes of Kauri Cliffs, Cape Kidnappers, Te Arai and even the famously elusive Tara Iti isn’t merely about testing their mettle on destination courses. It’s just as much about experiencing the kind of transportive landscapes that helped turn New Zealand into a go-to fantasy film backdrop.

Just outside the capital, Royal Wellington Golf Club is quietly moving in the opposite direction. One of only two clubs in the country with a Royal designation (the other being Royal Auckland and Grange), the over century-old private club’s Heretaunga course set alongside the Hutt River, doesn’t get nearly the same breathless adulation as the aforementioned A-listers. The club also has a 9-hole track, the terrace course plotted alongside the main course, composed of many of the holes that were part of the club’s original eighteen where hall of famer Bob Charles won his first New Zealand Open.

But Royal Wellington’s leadership, currently in the midst of a five-year strategic plan, isn’t chasing viral views, tourism dollars or recognition as the end goal. Instead, the focus is on a more delicate and familiar club challenge: how to increase interest and ensure long-term sustainability without compromising the experience of the members who define it.

A spotlight is about to shine on the club as the host of the 2026 Women’s Amateur Asia-Pacific Championship February 12-15^th. For the winner, the week offers a direct pathway to the game’s biggest stages, with exemptions into three majors—the Chevron Championship, the AIG Women’s Open and the Amundi Evian Championship—along with entry into the Augusta National Women’s Amateur and other elite events.

It will mark the first time New Zealand has hosted the region’s premier women’s amateur, but the club is no stranger to the spotlight. The club has previously staged the New Zealand Men’s Amateur in 2017, and the Heretaunga course has hosted seven New Zealand Opens, most recently in 1995—a testament to both the course’s championship pedigree and the club’s capacity to deliver on a major stage.

The championship has also developed a reputation as a proving ground for the next generation of stars. World No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul won the title in 2018 and finished runner-up a year later, while 2023 champion Eila Galitsky has since emerged as a standout collegiate player at the University of South Carolina, underscoring the tournament’s status as a bridge from elite amateur golf to the highest levels of the professional game.

Guiding the club through that moment is Mike O’Neil, Royal Wellington’s current Club Captain, a volunteer role that places him at the center of some of the club’s most consequential decisions. In New Zealand’s traditional golf club structure, the captaincy carries real weight and authority.

The hope is that the tournament shines a spotlight on Royal Wellington that elevates its profile and broadens awareness—while remaining, at its core, a private club that welcomes visitor play.

O’Neil is careful not to oversell Royal Wellington as a destination, but he argues that the course rewards attention in ways that don’t always get captured in photos on the venue. The Heretaunga layout blends parkland and links characteristics, shaped by shifting winds off the Hutt Valley and features greens that demand constant reads, even from close range.

“There isn’t a straight three-foot putt on this golf course,” he said, describing a test that favors forethought as much as execution. That balance was reinforced during a recent visit from senior officials at the R&A, including its chief agronomist and head of competition, who were invited to play the course ahead of the championship. Their verdict, O’Neil recalled, was unequivocal — the course was “perfect” but there was one caveat. While dazzled by the mettle testing elements of the greens, they did advise that not to push them past 10 on the stimp meter. At those speeds the feeling was, the field could get embarrassed.

To tourists, New Zealand golf can veer toward stunt sport, as the sensory experience—clear rivers, rolling hills and tranquil birdsong—threatens to upstage the golf itself. Royal Wellington resists that stereotype. Yes, there is unavoidable eye candy and landscape that can blur the line between reality and CGI, but it isn’t what the club is built around.

“It’s worth twenty dollars just to walk around,” he said which is why the club actually charges that amount for the privilege.

Playing, of course, costs considerably more, a quiet signal that at Royal Wellington the scenery is incidental and not the product. The absolute value is measured less in spectacle than in the substance of the test.

Future Script Flip

For over twenty years, the gravitational pull for traveling golfers heading to New Zealand centered on the late Julian Robertson’s headline acts of Kauri Cliffs and Cape Kidnappers—remote, visually arresting golf wonderlands.

O’Neil believes that the mystique-first model is nearing its limits. In its place, he sees a broader recalibration underway, one that favors depth of area course offerings over spectacle, so the ability to play a cluster of high-quality golf in one locale over isolated gems. Currently Cape Kidnappers commands peak-season green fees of roughly $565, while Royal Wellington’s Heretaunga course is priced at about $172 for international visitors, in U.S. dollars.

Royal Wellington is positioning itself for that next chapter, when clusters of quality play replace one-off destinations, by investing in the consistency of its conditioning. The club’s aforementioned five-year strategic plan includes a guaranteed $2 million investment towards upgrading their greens (already the club’s pride and joy) to improve year-round consistency. 25 minutes north, up the Gaffney coast is Paraparaumu and then if you keep going another half hour north construction is underway on Douglas Links, a $50 million dune-strewn links course being developed by Xero co-founder Hamish Edwards abutting a stretch of beach at Ohau in Horowhenua.

O’Neil feels three years from now, those top fifteen places to play in New Zealand list will have more of a Wellington area flavor in the top echelon. He frames the club’s ambition less around exclusivity than balance.

“There’s a certain cachet about being available, and a certain cachet about not being available,” he said, acknowledging the tension modern golf destinations increasingly face. Royal Wellington’s bet is that accessibility — paired with quality — can be an asset rather than a dilution, particularly as the greater Wellington area emerges as a hub where visiting golfers can play multiple high-level courses in a single trip.